


warm blood (underneath my skin)

by smithens



Series: a web that you have wove [2]
Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Begging, Blood Drinking, Consensual Mind Control, Dark Comedy, Erotica, Hand Feeding, Hypnosis, M/M, No Sex, Praise Kink
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-06
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:26:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27918193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smithens/pseuds/smithens
Summary: Thomas gives blood. Richard is reminded of the complications of having a human boyfriend.
Relationships: Thomas Barrow/Richard Ellis
Series: a web that you have wove [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2044741
Comments: 4
Kudos: 44





	warm blood (underneath my skin)

**Author's Note:**

> **content notes:** mind control with prior consent, blood drinking written like a sex scene, mindfuck with aftercare, dark humor

**Summer, 1928**

"The best place is the hand, actually," Richard was saying, "fingers, to be specific, but the problem there is it shows, after, hurts, too, and it takes more time than we've got into the bargain… works better if you're just doing a bit at a time on a regular basis."

Huh.

"Why the hand?"

Richard paused in the middle of unbuttoning his shirt. He turned back over his shoulder, looked Thomas in the eye. "I don't like to get too close to veins if I can help it," he said. "Capillaries are safer."

Somehow that hadn't yet sunk in.

Thomas didn't know if it was Richard's fault or if he was just very stupid. Probably it was a bit of both.

Two weeks ago he'd explained it all in detail— 

_You understand the consequences could be very severe._

_I do._

_If anything were to go wrong–_

_Don't you do this every month?_

_Well, yeah, Thomas, but–_

_What has a royal hall boy got that I haven't?_

—and by the end of it, all Thomas had been left with was more excitement than was suitable and the feeling that he didn't actually have any idea just what it was he was getting himself into. He didn't exactly like pain, for one thing. And the last time he'd lost blood in any significant amount was not an occasion he looked upon fondly.

It was a very small chance, he reasoned. Richard had been sucking people's blood at least once a month for the last nine years and nobody had died before, so it was unlikely to happen now, wasn't it? 

He'd come up with that one entirely on his own, seeing as Richard had made a point of countering it on every chance he'd got.

But it was so hard to believe, now, as he watched him undress before the mirror… The mirror that wasn't reflecting anything but the room behind him.

 _That_ had been a fun discovery.

 _Your lover is a vampire,_ the world seemed to be saying. _What the fuck are you doing._

He was doing something he'd been sure he wanted for a while, was what.

 _It's going to be tough for you to say no,_ Richard had told him. _No, I shouldn't put it like that—Thomas, as soon as I'm in form it'll be_ impossible, _you've got to think this over carefully._

Thomas had replied that that was why he was saying _yes_ in advance.

Still, it was overwhelming, now, knowing he was being affected in that way and couldn't do anything to stop it—and that he didn't _want_ to stop it. Something was off about it, like his head and heart knew what they wanted but the rest of his body wasn't having it. 

And Richard wasn't even _in form_ yet.

"It ought to be mostly painless, though," Richard went on, "if we do it right."

"What do you mean, do it right?"

"I'm gifted, Mr Barrow."

"So, what, you can just…?"

Thomas made a vague gesture with his hand.

"Just what?"

"Well, is it, er, the mind thing, or…?" 

Richard laughed. "Yeah," he said, tugging his braces off over his shoulders, and Thomas couldn't tear his eyes away no matter what he did, "yeah, it _is_ the mind thing."

Thomas nodded.

It was a bit concerning, he could admit that, but if it were actually that much of a risk, Richard wouldn't have him do it. They both knew that by now.

"Where're you gonna do it, then?" he asked. "When you drink."

"I was thinking your shoulder."

"My shoulder?"

"Yeah–from the back." He turned around again, to meet Thomas's gaze, and for what must have been the hundredth time in the hour Thomas was breathless. "I'd like to try out going for the hands, though," he added. "Sometime."

"Any time."

"Let's start with _eventually_."

* * *

"It won't hurt," said Richard, stroking his thumb at the hollow of Thomas's cheek, fingers bent under his chin, caressing over the pulse point in his neck in his neck. "It won't hurt, Thomas."

Then his hand slipped lower, and Thomas opened his mouth to take his thumb between his lips.

 _This is backwards,_ he thought. It made him laugh.

Richard laughed, too.

"It won't hurt," he repeated, tilting into his mouth, pressing the pad of his thumb to his teeth, at his canines; it was like everything he was doing, he was doing to draw attention to the fact that they were _different_. His smile was broad and it reached his eyes and Thomas wanted more than anything to keep it there, to keep him happy and contented _because of him_ and not anything or anybody else, that was _his_ job—

So there it was already, that feeling like he'd do anything if he asked, no matter what it was.

He knew it wasn't his own—well, it _sort of_ wasn't his own, he felt that way even when they were apart and that was generally speaking how he felt about his lovers, though under the usual circumstances he definitely had some bloody limits—but he didn't want it to go away, at the same time. He wanted to please and to be pleasing.

Regretfully Richard chose that moment to take his fingers out of his mouth. 

It was the same sensation as a bloke pulling out in the middle of a fuck, and he only just stopped himself from lifting his head up to have him back.

"You'll enjoy yourself, Thomas."

Thomas spoke up with undaunted conviction—"there's not much I wouldn't enjoy from you."

Richard stilled; he raised his eyebrows. "Is that you or me talking?"

"...you, probably."

"Right." And then he was silent, for just a moment. One long enough that Thomas could look at him—him nude and so pale that his skin shone in the lamplight, reflecting. As the moon did. "I'd forgotten what it's like with lovers."

As the moon did on all nights but ones like this.

It was mesmerising.

"Is it worse?" Thomas asked.

"Or better, depending on how you look at it."

"How do you look at it?"

"Well," he said, after a pause, and Thomas could tell he was turning the words over before he said them, walking on eggshells. Whether it was because he thought he would be sensitive about the answer or something else wasn't clear, but he hoped that wasn't it, because he wanted to know. Very badly. It mattered, what he thought of him, more than anything else, and if he wasn't worthy of hearing it then he'd–

Really, Thomas wondered sometimes if Richard being _like this_ just brought out all the thoughts he had anyway but felt too awkward about to ever actually bring up. Or, admit to having at all.

Because it wasn't new, really.

"It's true, though," he said, because he wasn't going to talk, apparently. "About what I'd enjoy."

"Get back to me on that one in two weeks," Richard said wryly. "But no, I… I'd say more intense, is the best of way of putting it."

"But do you like that it is?" Thomas pressed. 

Richard opened his mouth like he was going to speak, but in the end only licked his lips. Thomas doubted he knew he'd done it.

And when still no words came, Thomas lifted his head and shoulders after all: he kissed Richard's thumb just once before gathering his wits enough to push himself up all the way and look him in the eyes, his wide blue eyes that were suddenly more enchanting than they'd been before, and he felt as if he could get lost in them and never actually want to be found. "Do you like me falling all over myself for you?"

"Well," Richard said again, something odd in his voice, and Thomas realised he hadn't been breathing— _good,_ that he could have such an effect on him, that he could make him forget all the little things he had to do to seem human—

Because he _wasn't_ human, he wasn't, he was above it, free from all the trappings it came with, better than any of them could ever dream of being, and how lucky he was that even though Richard could have anybody, any mere mortal he wanted, that he had chosen _Thomas,_ that he thought _Thomas_ was worthy enough to serve him–

And he was going to be so good for him, he was, he was going to do anything and everything he could to satisfy him, to give him what he needed, he owed him that, he owed him the use of his body, he owed him every pulse of his heartbeat–

This was what he was made for, this was what his whole life had been leading him towards, was the chance to give himself over–

Give him every drop of what flowed through his veins–

Give his whole life over–

It was _Richard's_ now–

He'd been _chosen_ –

" _Thomas._ "

"Just bite me already," Thomas breathed– 

But then something cleared in his head, and he discovered he was sitting in Richard's _lap,_ straddling his hips, his head tilted in such a way as his neck was in just the right place that Richard could lower his head and open his mouth and– 

None of the thoughts he'd just had had been his.

It terrified and thrilled him at the same time.

"–when did you…?"

"Don't remember," said Richard, his brow furrowed, his fingers to his teeth. His _fangs_. Thomas hadn't even noticed him change, he'd looked ordinary as anything just before, but...

"Did _I_ make you do that?" Thomas asked, wondrous.

"Yeah," Richard murmured, and he caught Thomas's wrist _just_ before he would have succeeded in sticking his fingers in his mouth, strong like a vice. "Yeah." He swallowed, audibly, and Thomas couldn't tear his eyes away from his throat. "That happens with lovers, too."

**Author's Note:**

> "none of this makes scientific sense" that's because it's magic


End file.
